On 9 Mar, 11:58, Tom Anderson wrote:
On Fri, 9 Mar 2007, Bob wrote:
'I can't think of any PFI project we have inherited that wasn't
dysfunctional in one way or another." So said Ken Livingstone, in
typically forthright fashion.

So who negotiated the contract in the first place?

Presumably it was London Regional Transport (LRT), which was then an
organisation controlled more or less directly by central government,
specifically by the Department of Transport. The contract was signed
between Tramtrack Croydon Ltd and London Bus Services Ltd - which was,
and still is, the legal entity that organises bus services in London
(at the time it was part of LRT, but when the GLA was set up it became
a subsidiary of Transport for London).

I don't know exactly what role all the different bodies played in
this, but as the money was coming from central government they
certainly dictated the broad terms of this PFI contract. Who exactly
is to blame for the detail, i.e. the inadequacies of the Tramlink
contract, I'm not so sure. In a way it doesn't much matter now, at
least with regards to the specific issues that Tramlink has, in a way


Any chance this is going to put Ken off commissionairing the London
Overground?


No. The deal is done. AIUI the DfT agreed to let TfL control the
London Overground (LO) on the condition that it was operated as a
concession by a private sector company, so TfL would not have been
able to directly run it themselves and directly employ all the workers
(though I could be wrong on that).

The LO concession will however be handled by TfL themselves through
the TfL Rail division. TfL Rail are also responsible for the DLR,
which is run by a private company, Serco Docklands Ltd, and TfL find
this a very satisfactory arrangement. So I'd suggest that TfL will
very carefully specify the contract for the LO concession, and will
have a good relationship with the operator.